


Beating Heart of Stone

by KatiKitten



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Other, POV Second Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-15 04:15:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29678280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KatiKitten/pseuds/KatiKitten
Summary: You are the Black Widow. Not the first to earn the title, and far from the last, but you are the one that people mean when they say that name. It's a name drenched in blood, and oh, oh how you earned it.
Kudos: 2





	Beating Heart of Stone

You are the Black Widow. Not the first to earn the title, and far from the last, but you are the one that people mean when they say that name.

It's a name drenched in blood, and oh, oh how you earned it. 

*** 

You are unmade so many times that you don't know how to put yourself back together. You have pieces of everyone you've ever been inside you and together those pieces make up a broken person. 

You fall in love, but it's not you, it's the person they made you be for the mission. 

It's never you, _it's never you,_ it's always your cover, the role you play. 

You fall in love. This time it's you. 

He doesn't remember you when he shoots you years later. 

*** 

You're a survivor. You're pragmatic. You know what your lot in life is, and you're good at it. 

There's so much blood that you drip with it. This is what you are. This is who you are. 

You run into a SHIELD agent on a mission. You're on opposite sides. 

He's supposed to kill you. 

You think you might be ready for death this time. 

He decides to bring you with him instead. 

Fucking Budapest. 

You don't regret it, no matter how hard you have to prove yourself now. No one trusts you other than Clint, and you understand why. 

You wouldn't trust you, either. 

You and Clint are partners. For a while, you make an attempt at lovers but. It's not what you're meant to be for each other. You can't be someone's everything, and he needs you at his back more than he needs you in his bed. 

You still fall into bed together occasionally. 

Well, that's a lie. You sleep together often, but it usually really is sleep, back to back and protecting each other through the night. 

You can't be his everything. You don't know how to be. But you will always be his protector. You owe him a debt you can never repay. 

*** 

_"Know your worth,"_ Peggy Carter said many times, especially to the new agents. Especially to the new female agents. _"They'll always look for a way to explain how you succeeded where they failed, or to highlight your failures instead of your successes. Own your failures, own your successes, and know your worth because you can't ever count on anyone else to."_

You prove yourself, over and over, and you know that it will never be enough. 

You fail, more than you would like to admit. 

It's the failures you remember more than your successes. 

You know your worth. You're the Black Widow. 

*** 

You don't want to deal with Tony Stark. You've heard the stories about him. You have to deal with enough egotistical bullies in SHIELD and you don't want to add another. 

But there's more to him than that. He's brilliant and he's arrogant, but he cares more than he will ever let on. 

You understand him because you are more like him than you will _ever_ admit to. 

He's just as broken as you are, he just hides it differently. He has Pepper and Happy, though, so he'll be okay. 

You have Clint and a cat you feed on your fire escape, but the cat doesn't have a name and he never comes inside. 

If you name him, if you let him in, it means you care. it means he depends on you. It means he's your pet. 

You don't let anyone other than Clint depend on you. You for damn sure don't allow yourself to depend on anyone other than Clint. 

*** 

You're on a mission when you get the phone call you've been dreading. 

Clint's compromised. 

You do what you have to do while inside you're screaming. 

Screw the mission. Even if you hadn't already gotten the information you needed, you'd have done exactly the same thing. 

You have to get Bruce Banner. You've read the file. He intrigues you. 

He also scares you, though you are loathe to admit it. But your response to fear has always been to run into it headlong, to face it and make it fear you instead. 

Hulk scares you more when you're _running from him thousands of feet in the air Fury you bastard why did you think Banner on the hellicarrier was a good idea?_

You get Clint back. That's what matters. 

You lose Phil. You... are not prepared for this. You aren't prepared for how much it _hurts._ He wasn't a friend, not in the way that Clint was, but... he was family. If Clint is your heart, Phil was your steady mind. 

Without Phil, Clint wouldn't have been able to make the call he did with you. You also know that Phil was supposed to complete the mission if Clint did exactly what he did, but instead he backed Clint. 

You lose Phil and it hurts _so damn much_ and you don't know how to deal with it. You've lost people before but... not people you cared about. 

This is why you don't care about people. It hurts too god damn much when they abandon you. 

*** 

You try to set Steve up. You have a lot in common with him, though he is a far, _far_ better person than you are, and if he can't be happy, what chance do you have? So you keep trying to set him up with people and he's frustratingly stubborn so it keeps not happening. 

You'll make it happen. You're just as frustratingly stubborn as he is. 

He doesn't seem to understand sometimes that even when you're on the same mission, you have a different mission. And it's not that you don't trust him, because you do, but you know that _everyone_ can be compromised. 

You trust him. You wish he trusted you, too. 

Then you trust nobody in SHIELD because it turns out that HYDRA infiltrated right under your nose. 

You're more than a little surprised when Zola's brain gives your birthdate as 1984. That was one of your covers, not your own. It's about sixty years, give or take, out of date. 

Steve protects you with his own body, because _of course he does._

You'll have to try harder to set him up with one of the waitresses. 

You know what it means, to dump all the information on the internet. You know what the world will know about _you_ as a result. But you trust Steve, and if this is the call he's making, it's the call you'll follow with no hesitation. 

It's a lot harder to tase yourself, but you trust Fury. Not as much as you trusted Phil, far from how much you trust Clint and Steve, but you trust Fury and he has yet to let you down. Your trust isn't misplaced, and he does exactly what you'd hoped he would. 

*** 

You're afraid of Hulk, but you trust Bruce. Your reaction to fear has always been to chase it, to put yourself against your fear again and again and again until you no longer fear it and instead it fears you. 

You're not afraid of Bruce. He's gentle and sweet and he deserves far better than you, but he's got a little bit of a monster in him so he recognizes the monster in you. 

You're not afraid of Bruce right up until you are, when you realize that somewhere along the way you've started to fall in love with him and now he has the power to hurt you. 

But love is for children. You just let yourself forget that somewhere along the way. 

*** 

You have a family. It's not the family you started out with but it's _yours_ and it means something. 

Your family _shatters_ after Lagos. Neither Tony nor Steve are wrong, but neither of them are seeing the whole picture. Steve sees the failings of the Accords. Tony sees it as checks and balances. You see it as inevitable. It's _going_ to happen, whether you agree or not. If you agree, you'll at least have _some_ control over it. 

You're used to going where you're sent, to obeying orders. Steve is not. 

Steve's response was inevitable, too, you think. 

You go to Peggy's funeral for a few reasons. For Peggy, because she'd earned your respect and admiration a long time ago. For Steve, because you didn't want him to be alone. 

And a little bit for yourself. 

You know that Steve is going to go for Bucky as soon as you call him. You also know that it's the worst thing he could do for Bucky and you try to convince him of that, but since when are you able to convince Steve Rogers of anything? 

When the power goes out, you know what the plan was. It's exactly what you would do if you needed the Winter Soldier. 

You can tell the difference between Bucky and the Soldier. You never knew Bucky, but you _recognize_ the Soldier. 

You just wish he'd recognize you, too. 

He doesn't. He won't. You try to tuck that away and move on. 

You _try._

Berlin goes... about how you'd expect, with everyone fighting each other. You and Clint pick each other, because you won't let Clint be hurt seriously, and you're pretty sure Clint already knows what you're going to do even though you haven't completely decided on it yet. 

Rhodey, though. That you're _not_ expecting, and Tony is _so angry_ that you don't want to be anywhere near him. 

You had a family. You thought you had a place you belonged. It shattered. 

Love is a children's story, anyway. 

*** 

You go on the run. This isn't new to you. You're used to this kind of life. This is why you never named the cat on your fire escape. You hope the new tenants feed him sometimes. 

You keep moving. You don't let anyone too close to you. 

Sometimes you even get to see Clint. 

This isn't right. This isn't _right,_ this isn't the way things were supposed to be. 

But you're just one person. You can't fix this. 

*** 

Something big is coming. You can _feel_ it, like lightning in your bones. Something big is coming. 

Something big is _here_ already. 

You thought you'd already lost your family. 

You lose _everything._ You lose everyone except Steve. Steve turns into the person you can count on, and.. 

It's like Clint all over again. You fall into bed sometimes because you're desperate to feel, you're desperate for companionship. You sleep with him more often than not because you need to have someone at your back, someone you can protect. 

You can't be his everything but you can be his _something_ at least for a little while. 

You remember to eat most of the time when he's around, because you don't want to deal with his lecture if you don't. You go through the motions of taking care of yourself because you don't want to disappoint him. You run this ragtag group, what's left of your family, and Steve's the one who holds you up when you feel like you can't stand. 

You keep going because you're too stubborn to give up. But every breath is a reminder of what you've lost. 

You've lost _everything._

*** 

_"Know your worth,"_ Peggy Carter used to say. 

Your worth is in what you do. It's never been in who you are, because you _know_ your worth as a person, or lack thereof. 

You can bring everyone back, and that's the worthiest thing you can think of. 

You don't even hesitate in your choice. 

You're a survivor. You always have been. You clawed your way past death too many times for you to count, because you just weren't ready yet, for all that you were prepared for it in New York, in Washington, in Sokovia. 

You're ready. You chose this. 

Clint will never forgive you for this, but this has been your whole goal for yearrs. Bring your family back, by any means necessary. 

By any means necessary. 

You always thought dying would be hard, but it's the easiest thing in the world, easy as falli-

**Author's Note:**

> I am so very sorry.
> 
> If it helps, I headcanon that Steve got her back when he returned the Soul Stone, because a soul for a soul. If you want that happy ending, give a very large page break and then:
> 
> *** 
> 
> You take a breath and look around.
> 
> Well, hell, now you have to deal with Clint never forgiving you, after all.


End file.
